John Connally
John Bowden Connally Jr. was an American politician who served as the 39th governor of Texas from 1963 to 1969 and as the 61st United States secretary of the treasury from 1971 to 1972. He began his career as a Democrat and became a Republican in 1973.
Connally was born in Floresville, Texas in 1917 and pursued a legal career after graduating from the University of Texas at Austin. During World War II, he served on the staff of James Forrestal and Dwight D. Eisenhower before transferring to the Asiatic-Pacific Theater. After the war, he became an aide to Senator Lyndon B. Johnson. When Johnson assumed the vice presidency in 1961, he convinced President John F. Kennedy to appoint Connally to the position of United States Secretary of the Navy. Connally left the Kennedy Administration in December 1961 to successfully run for Governor of Texas. In 1963, Connally was riding in the presidential limousine when Kennedy was assassinated, and was seriously wounded. During his governorship, he was a conservative Democrat.
In 1971, Republican President Richard Nixon appointed Connally as his treasury secretary. In this position, Connally presided over the removal of the United States dollar from the gold standard, an event known as the Nixon shock. Connally stepped down from the Cabinet in 1972 to lead the Democrats for Nixon organization, which campaigned for Nixon's re-election. Connally was on Nixon's short list to replace Vice President Spiro Agnew after the latter resigned in 1973, but Gerald Ford was chosen instead. Connally sought the Republican nomination for president in the 1980 election, but withdrew from the race after the first set of primaries. Connally did not seek public office again after 1980 and died of pulmonary fibrosis in 1993.
Early life and education
Connally was born on February 27, 1917, into a large family in Floresville, the seat of Wilson County, southeast of San Antonio. He was the third of seven children born to Lela and John Bowden Connally, a dairy and tenant farmer. His six siblings included four brothers: Golfrey, Merrill, Wayne and Stanford, and sisters Carmen and Blanche. According to Ronnie Dugger, Connally's family had "had no money, no home, and no furniture." Connally's parents grew even poorer because of the Great Depression, and when speaking about his poverty, Connally often recalled that he had to study by kerosene light.Despite the initial hardship, John Bowden Connally was able to lift the family out of poverty by running a successful bus route, and by 1932 the family bought a 1000-acre farm. The income from the farm was enough to cover Connally's tuition. Connally attended Floresville High School and was one of the few graduates who attended college. He graduated from the University of Texas at Austin, where he was the student body president and a member of the Friar Society. It was at the University of Texas where he met his future wife Nellie Connally. He subsequently graduated from the University of Texas School of Law and was admitted to the bar by examination.
In 1936, Connally met and befriended Lyndon B. Johnson, of whom he remained a political ally and friend for Johnson's entire life. Johnson helped Connally get a job in the campus library, and Connally played a minor role in Johnson's bid for Congress in 1937. Johnson rewarded Connally for his help by taking him to Washington in 1939, where Connally remained until 1941, when he joined the Naval Reserve.
Military service and legal career
Connally served in the United States Navy, starting on June 11, 1941, as an ensign during World War II, first as an aide to James V. Forrestal. Subsequently, he was on General Dwight D. Eisenhower's staff for planning the North African campaign. After transferring to the South Pacific Theater, he served as fighter-plane director aboard the aircraft carrier USS Essex and was awarded the Bronze Star for bravery. After being transferred to the USS Bennington, he was awarded the Legion of Merit. He was discharged in January 1946 at the rank of lieutenant commander.Connally practiced law in the Alvin Wirtz law firm, until Lyndon Baines Johnson, then a newly elected senator, persuaded him to return to Washington, to serve as a key aide. He had close ties with Johnson before his navy days and maintained them until the former president's death in 1973.
Two of Connally's principal legal clients were the Texas oil tycoon Sid W. Richardson and Perry Bass, Richardson's nephew and partner, both of Fort Worth. Richardson's empire in the 1950s was estimated at $200 million to $1 billion. Under Richardson's tutelage, Connally gained experience in a variety of enterprises and received tips on real estate purchases. The work required the Connallys to relocate to Fort Worth. When Richardson died in 1959, Connally was named to the lucrative position of co-executor of the estate.
Connally was also involved in a reported clandestine deal to place the Texas Democrat Robert Anderson on the 1956 Republican ticket as vice president. Although the idea fell through when Dwight Eisenhower retained Richard Nixon in the second slot, Anderson received a million dollars for his efforts and a subsequent appointment as U.S. Treasury Secretary.
From Navy secretary to Texas politics
Following the end of World War II, Connally worked in Johnson's radio station KTBC in Austin, Texas, before borrowing $25,000 in 1946 to found a new radio station KVET. He was the president of the radio station between 1946 and 1949. Connally became a chief strategist for Lyndon Johnson's 1948 Senate race, and is reported to have said: "I really ran the campaign that year." Connally almost ended up running for office instead of Johnson because of the latter's reluctance, but Johnson eventually did settle on partaking in the election.At the 1960 Democratic convention in Los Angeles, Connally led supporters of Senator Lyndon Johnson. His argument that John F. Kennedy would be an unsuitable president due to having Addison's disease and a dependence on cortisone was fruitless, as Kennedy had already secured the needed delegates for nomination before the convention even opened. Kennedy made Johnson his running mate in order to secure the support of Southern Democrats, and went on to win the 1960 presidential election.
Secretary of the Navy
At Johnson's request, in 1961 President Kennedy named Connally Secretary of the Navy. Connally resigned eleven months later to run for the Texas governorship. During Connally's secretaryship, the Navy had a budget of $14 billion and more than 1.2 million workers–600,000 in uniform and 650,000 civilian–stationed at 222 bases in the United States and 53 abroad.Connally directed the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea on a new kind of "gunboat diplomacy." The landed in Naples, Italy, and brought gifts to children in an orphanage. Connally also ordered gifts for a hospital in Cannes, France, that treated children with bone diseases, for poor Greek children on the island of Rhodes and for disabled children in Palermo, Italy. Presents were also sent to Turkish children in Cyprus and to a camp in Beirut for homeless Palestinian refugees. The Bay of Pigs incident occurred under his watch.
Connally fought hard to protect the Navy's role in the national space program, having vigorously opposed assigning most space research to the Air Force. Time termed Connally's year as Navy Secretary "a first-rate appointment." Critics noted, however, that the brevity of Connally's tenure precluded any sustained or comprehensive achievements.
Running for governor
Connally announced in December 1961 that he was leaving the position of Secretary of the Navy to seek the Democratic nomination for the 1962 Texas gubernatorial election. He would have to compete against the incumbent Marion Price Daniel Sr., who was running for a fourth consecutive two-year term. Daniel was in political trouble following the enactment of a two-cent state sales tax in 1961, which had soured many voters on his administration. Another opponent, Don Yarborough, was a liberal attorney from Houston favored by organized labor. Former state Attorney General Will Wilson also entered the campaign, criticizing Johnson, who he claimed had engineered Connally's candidacy.Connally ran as a conservative Democrat. Connally waged the most active campaign of any of the Democrats, traveling more than 22,000 miles across the state. He made 43 major speeches and appeared on multiple statewide and local telecasts. Biographer Charles Ashman called Connally a "total professional" when it came to campaigning. During the campaign, Connally courted crowds and travelled with aides to make for a more noticeable entrance when he arrived at events. Ashman claimed that Connally would have aides telephone airports ask to page him for an urgent message, in order to give the impression that he was much in demand.
According to a 1961 poll, only 1% of Texas voters were willing to back Connally, which forced him to make ground rapidly. Connally appeared conservative, but did often highlight his position in the Kennedy Administration in attempt to appeal to Hispanic and Afro-American voters. Connally refused to debate Yarborough, and resorted to attacking him in subtle ways instead, attacking him as a candidate of Americans for Democratic Action, which "was like equating him with the Communist party" in a Southern state like Texas.
Eventually he was placed in a primary runoff election against Yarborough, which he won by a close vote. Connally's Republican opponent for the governor's office was conservative Republican Jack Cox, also of Houston. Connally received 847,038 ballots to Cox's 715,025. In the campaign, Connally made an issue of Cox having switched to the Republican party the previous year; eleven years later, Connally made the same switch.
Governor of Texas
Connally served as governor from 1963 until 1969. In the campaigns of 1964 and 1966, Connally defeated weak Republican challenges offered by Jack Crichton, a Dallas oil industrialist, and Thomas Everton Kennerly Sr., of Houston, respectively. He prevailed with margins of 73.8 percent and 72.8 percent, respectively, giving him greater influence with the nearly all-Democratic legislature.Connally was governor during a time of great expansion of higher education in Texas. He signed into law the creation of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. He appointed regents who backed the entry of women into previously all-male Texas A&M University in College Station, having been prompted to take such action by State Senator William T. "Bill" Moore of Bryan, who in 1953 had first proposed the admission of women to the institution.
File:Gov. John Connally signing bill that separated Arlington State College from the Texas A&M system.jpg|thumb|Governor Connally signing the bill that separated Arlington State College from the Texas A&M University System in 1965
Following the Assassination of John F. Kennedy, Connally "became almost a demigod symbol to the voters in Texas which would assure him an overwhelming victory in 1964". The governor became very religious and believed that he had been saved by God for a reason. He wrote: "Now I feel that, rather than being elected, maybe I'm one of God's elect. The good Lord chose to leave me here, so I figure I'm one of God's elect."
Following his re-election in 1964, Connally grew critical of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society and was willing to block its enaction in Texas. Connally was also a bitter opponent of trade unions and strongly supported right-to-work law in Texas, which led the AFL-CIO to call for his resignation. Texas Republicans strongly commended Connally for his conservative views, and a Houston Republican Albert B. Fay said that he wanted "to publicly commend him and invite him into the Republican party."
Connally cemented himself as a very conservative Democrat, even by the standards of the Solid South, which led many to believe that he was aligned more towards the Republican Party than his own. During the presidency of Johnson, Connally "spoke out for state vetoes on anti-poverty programs, publicly went on television to oppose the civil rights laws guaranteeing all citizens access to public accommodations, and other Great Society legislation." The liberal wing of the Democratic Party in Texas believed that a break between Connally and the president was imminent, given Connally's support for racial segregation and his opposition to Johnson's welfare policies. The split did not come to fruition and according to The New Republic, Johnson and Connally "agree to disagree".
Despite clashing with Johnson on the issue of segregation and economic policies, Connally agreed with the president's foreign policy, supported escalating the Vietnam War, and kept supporting Johnson even after the Vietnam War grew deeply unpopular. Connally fiercely defended the war, and accused Democratic progressives such as Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern of supporting "appeasement and surrender"; in turn, Pierre Salinger accused Connally of endorsing "old-type Joe McCarthyism". Eugene Nickerson remarked that Connally's view on the Vietnam War was "blood thirsty" and that he expressed support "for bigger and better wars". Connally remained a hardline hawk his entire life, and consistently pressured President Johnson to stay aggressive towards Vietnam.
As governor of Texas, Connally also had a strained relationship with Afro-Americans and Latin Americans, and was reported to have "snubbed a group of Latin Americans in 1966 who walked 350 miles to ask him to support a state minimum wage". This earned Connally a reputation of a reactionary, deeply conservative, and insensitive politician. In 1966, Connally defended his views by saying: "In a sense it is a dirty business, but not corrupt. It's mean... It's tough... will say some mean things about you, but this is one of the burdens you have to bear. People say mean things about me-and they will this year".
Connally founded and thoroughly consolidated his political machine in Texas during his governorship, and said: "Texas is a one-party state, and I'll see to it that it stays that way." According to Robert Sherrill, Connally moved the state in a conservative direction, and "controlled the men who controlled the politics in Texas—all conservative". This allowed the governor to successfully prevent the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 from being enforced in the state.
By Spring of 1967, Connally announced that he would not seek a fourth term because of his failing health: he suffered from stomach ulcer. Reevaluating the governorship of John Connally, Rita Lynne Colbert concludes:
As governor, Connally promoted HemisFair '68, the world's fair held in San Antonio, which he suggested could net the state an additional $12 million in direct taxes. He also supported turning the fair's Texas Pavilion into a permanent museum, the Institute of Texan Cultures, describing his vision for it as "a dramatic showcase, not only to Texans, but to all the world, of the host of diverse peoples from many lands whose blood and dreams built our state."
There was some talk of Connally being selected as Hubert Humphrey's running mate on the Democratic ticket in 1968, but liberal Senator Edmund Muskie of Maine was chosen instead. Connally publicly endorsed Humphrey, but the relationship was not always smooth. According to then-Representative Ben Barnes, in a private meeting at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, Connally angrily accused Humphrey of being disloyal to President Johnson by trying to soft-pedal Johnson's position regarding Vietnam. Ashman claims that during this time Connally was "privately helping Nixon, recruiting a number of influential Texans, members of both parties, to work for the Republican candidate."
Connally was succeeded as governor by Lieutenant Governor Preston Smith.